Tech.006 · Embedded Systems

Embedded Systems

Hardware & Electronics.

When the rabbit hole has a power cord.

An installation that responds to the world needs eyes and hands of its own. Sensors are the eyes — proximity, motion, light, sound, touch. Actuators are the hands — motors, lights, speakers, solenoids. Sitting between them is a microcontroller: a chip the size of a fingernail running a program that turns sensor readings into actuator commands.

Read the breakdown ↓ Book a Demo →

Voltage

3.3 / 5 V

Clock

240 MHz

Cost

$4 + up

SYSHW.PCB

NETI²C · UART · GPIO

STATEPOLLING

VCC 3.3V
CLK 240MHz
BUS I²C

Live · Polling

100 Hz

01 · The thirty-second version

A microcontroller, a sensor, a wire.

A microcontroller is a single chip that combines a CPU, RAM, flash storage, and a bunch of digital input/output pins into something the size of a fingernail. You write a program once, flash it onto the chip, and it runs that loop forever — reading sensors, deciding things, driving outputs — at a few volts and a couple hundred milliwatts.

The classic example: a capacitive touch sensor wired to one of those pins. The chip reads the pin a few hundred times a second. When the value crosses a threshold (a finger touched the surface), the chip flips a different pin high, which turns on an addressable LED strip wrapped around the inside of the prop. Sensor → logic → actuator. Whole thing fits on a breadboard.

Scale that pattern up. Replace the LED with a stepper motor. Replace the touch sensor with a LiDAR. Replace the breadboard with a custom PCB. Replace the single chip with a network of them talking over I²C or MQTT. The principle stays the same: read the world, decide, write the world. The art is in the timing, debouncing, and quiet failure modes.

◉ HW.TRACE

02 · The I/O loop

Read, decide, write.

A few thousand iterations per second. Forever. The whole installation hangs on this loop staying responsive.

Sense

Sensor changes a voltage on a pin (analog) or toggles it (digital). Real-world signal becomes a number.

Read GPIO

Microcontroller polls the pin (or reacts to an interrupt). Raw value debounced, smoothed, calibrated.

Logic

State machine, threshold check, formula. Decision is made: should the actuator change state, and how.

Drive

PWM signal generated, voltage written to output pin. Often through a transistor or driver IC for higher current.

Actuate

Motor spins, LED lights, speaker drives, solenoid pushes. Real-world physical change. Loop repeats.

03 · The toolkit

Boards, sensors, protocols.

Each project picks from this list. We standardize on ESP32 + Raspberry Pi as the workhorses, but reach for specialized boards when the brief demands it.

MCU · GP

ESP32

$4 chip with WiFi + Bluetooth + dual core 240 MHz. Our default for connected props.

ESP32-S3 · C3 · WROOM

MCU · Easy

Arduino

The teaching language and IDE. Many shields, huge library ecosystem, slow vs ESP32.

Uno · Nano · Mega

MCU · Fast

Teensy

600 MHz ARM. Real-time audio, MIDI, USB host. Deterministic loops.

Teensy 4.1 · 4.0 · LC

SBC

Raspberry Pi

Full Linux, HDMI out, GPIO. Drives kiosks, runs Python, talks to MCUs.

Pi 5 · Pi Zero 2W · CM4

Sensor · Range

LiDAR · ToF

Time-of-flight depth sensors. Detect people without privacy concerns.

RPLidar · VL53L5CX

Sensor · Touch

Capacitive · Piezo

Touch through plastic, glass, or fabric. Force-sensitive piezo for taps and impacts.

MPR121 · FSR · TTP223

Output

Addressable LEDs

Individually-controlled RGB pixels on a single data line. The ubiquitous accent.

WS2812B · APA102 · SK6812

Protocol

I²C · SPI · UART

How chips talk to each other. I²C for many devices, SPI for fast, UART for everything else.

CAN · DMX · OSC · MQTT

04 · In the wild

Where we've shipped silicon.

Prop · Touch

Brand-shaped touch controllers

An ESP32 hidden in a brand-shaped enclosure. Capacitive touch on the surface. Addressable LED strips inside. MQTT over WiFi to a stage controller. Visitor taps it; the whole room responds. The chip costs four dollars; the moment is unforgettable.

ESP32MPR121WS2812B

Install · Sensor

Crowd-aware exhibit lighting

A grid of LiDAR sensors maps where visitors are standing in real time. Lighting and audio adapt — quieter zones get gentler ambience, dense zones get bigger reactions. The space feels like it's noticing you.

RPLidarPi 5Art-Net

Custom PCB

Run-once production boards

When breadboard prototypes have to ship for real, we lay out custom PCBs in KiCad and have small batches fabricated overseas. Cleaner, more reliable, and looks designed when you crack the case open.

KiCadJLCPCBReflow

Show-control bridge

Mobile-driven lighting

A custom Node server bridges visitor phones (over WebSocket) to a DMX universe. Visitors point their phones at the wall and the wall responds. The hardware is invisible; the moment isn't.

NodeDMX · Art-NetWebSocket

04.5 · Recent samples

Hardware we've shipped.

Drop replacement images as boards and rigs go out the door. Every card has a slot for a 4:3 product photo plus a tagged spec line.

◬ PLACEHOLDER HW.001 · ESP32 · TOUCH CTRL

SAMPLE.001

ESP32 touch controller

A $4 chip with WiFi + Bluetooth, capacitive touch over twelve channels, addressable LEDs out one pin. The workhorse for almost every interactive prop we ship.

ESP32MPR121WS2812B

▥ PLACEHOLDER HW.002 · CUSTOM PCB · KICAD

SAMPLE.002

Custom PCB run

When breadboard prototypes have to ship for real, we lay out the PCB in KiCad and have small batches fabricated overseas. Cleaner, more reliable, looks designed when the case opens.

KiCadJLCPCBReflow

◯ PLACEHOLDER HW.003 · LIDAR RIG · RPLIDAR

SAMPLE.003

LiDAR sensor rig

Spinning 2D LiDAR mounted on a custom bracket, fed into a Raspberry Pi 5 that publishes zone presence over MQTT. Detects visitors without privacy concerns from RGB cameras.

RPLidar A1Pi 5MQTT

▦ PLACEHOLDER HW.004 · LED MATRIX · WS2812B

SAMPLE.004

Addressable LED matrix

An array of WS2812B strips wired into a 32×8 matrix, driven by a Teensy 4.1 over a single data pin. The accent that turns a static prop into something that breathes.

WS2812BTeensy 4.1FastLED

▤ PLACEHOLDER HW.005 · DMX BRIDGE · ART-NET

SAMPLE.005

DMX show-control bridge

A custom Node server bridges visitor phones (over WebSocket) to a DMX universe via Art-Net. Phones in the audience drove the lighting on a real activation.

NodeArt-NetWebSocket

◷ PLACEHOLDER HW.006 · BREADBOARD · DEV

SAMPLE.006

The development bench

Where everything starts: a breadboard, a microcontroller, jumper wires, a logic analyzer, and a coffee. Photo of the actual workspace where the prototypes get debugged.

BreadboardLogic analyzerUSB-C scope

05 · The other seven

Adjacent stacks.

TECH.005

3D Printing

Additive Manufacturing

Read →

TECH.007

Events & Installation

Artificial Intelligence

Neural Networks

Read →

Need an interactive object?

Tell us what it should do. We'll wire the brain.

Touch, light, motion, sound, sensing — combinations of these solve almost every interactive-object brief. Tell us the input + the output, we'll prototype within a week and quote production within a business day.

Book a Demo → All 8 Stacks →